"I must go quickly," she said, quietly. "I must go. Me. Or there's no deal." She took a breath and said, "Why would you want to make sure I was not a part of this battle, Fidelias? Why now, instead of an hour ago? Why did you make this offer only after you saw me observing the enemy?"
"Don't do this to yourself, Amara," he said. "Don't rationalize your way out of life. Don't let it kill those children."
She swallowed. He was right, of course. Perhaps she was being manipulated. Perhaps accepting his offer would mean that she had sacrificed some unknown advantage. But could she really argue against that statement? Could she make some attempt to play at maneuvers against him, here, now, when she would almost certainly die? And when it would cost the lives of children.
Run. Save them. Grieve with the Crown over the Valley's loss.
"Your purpose as a Cursor is to save lives, Amara. Stay true to your purpose. And let me stay true to my choice."
The crows croaked and swooped all around her. She opened her mouth to agree.
But a sudden sound stopped her. Without warning, the ground began to rumble, low, hard, rhythmic. She staggered and had to crouch to keep her balance. She looked back at the walls of Garrison.
A shout went up from the legionares, who immediately marched forward, away from the walls, breaking into ragged formation as the pitching of the earth made them stagger left and right. They came out to the same distance she stood at and turned to stare at the walls with her.
The walls of Garrison heaved and shuddered, like a sleeper stirring. They rippled, a slow wave rolling through the seamless grey stone. And then, with a screeching of breaking earth, they began to grow.
Amara stared at it in sudden wonder. She had never seen any such feat done on such a scale before. The walls rolled up, higher, like a wave
approaching the shore. They ground forward several paces toward the enemy, until Amara realized that they were growing thicker at the base, to support the greater height. The walls grew, and the grim grey stone began to streak with ribbons of scarlet and azure, twined within the rock, the colors of Alera proper, and then with scarlet bound with gold, the colors of the Legion's home city of Riva. The battlements grew higher, and with an abrupt shriek of stone, spikes erupted at the summit of the battlements and then sprang out all along the walls themselves, long, slender daggers of some dark stone that gleamed in the growing light. The spikes spread, as though they were tendrils sprung from some deadly vines beneath the surface of the wall, and raced out over the ground before the walls as well, rippling into place like blades of grass growing all in an instant, their gleaming tips pointing out at the oncoming horde.
The crows, dismayed, flew into the sky in a sudden storm of black wings and raucous cawing, circling around the field of battle like wreathes of panicked smoke.
The rumbling eased. The walls of Garrison stood, thirty feet high and grim, and bristled with razor-edged daggers of the same black stone, Amara could now see, that the Marat used for their own weapons. The ground itself lay ready to impale any attackers.
And, in the stunned silence, she heard Fidelias's voice whisper, "Bloody crows."
The legionares beside her erupted into sudden cheers, and she was barely able to hold back the shout of defiance that came to her own throat. She snapped an order to the men, to send them back inside, and they began picking their way painfully across the field of spikes before the wall. One of the men slipped and cut his leg, drawing, of all things, a sudden and enthusiastic discussion about how sharp the spikes were and how well they'd cut him. The loudest voice of praise was from the injured man. More cheers rose up from inside the fortress, and as Amara watched, more legionares crowded the wall, and someone raised the banners of the Legion and of Riva into position above the gates. Within, one of the musicians began to trumpet the call to arms, and the legionares, professional and holder alike, answered it in a sudden roar that shook the stone of the hills framing the fortress.
Amara spun back out to face the horde coming over the plains and hissed, "Fight for what you want, Fidelias, but it will not be handed to you. The future of these men and women, children and soldier alike, is not cast in stone. If you want the fortress, then come and take it."
There was a long and terrible silence before Fidelias responded, and when he did, his voice was calm, even. "Good-bye, Amara."
With the softest whisper of wind, the contact faded.
Amara turned and called to Cirrus. She stepped forward and leapt lightly over the field of spikes, thirty yards or more, landing in the gate ahead of the legionares returning from outside. Her heart pounded in swift, hot defiance, determination.
She tried not to notice that it made her broken arm throb as well, with pain.
Amara moved quickly into the courtyard, and the shadows of the now-higher walls had changed the perspective of the entire place. It took her a moment to orient herself, but she spotted Bernard sitting at the base of the new wall with a group of jubilant-faced, panting men, talking. Shields and weaponry and breastplates lay near each man, and one of the women had brought water to them. As much seemed to have been tossed over their heads as down their throats, and their tunics were splotched with water, their breath turned to steam before smiling mouths. Pirellus stood nearby Bernard and nodded to her when he saw her.
"Interesting," Pirellus said, jerking his head back toward the wall. "It's going to force them to use their scaling poles and to try to take the gate. We'll be able to make a good fight of it, at least."
"Incredible," Amara said, grinning first at Pirellus and then at Bernard. "I've never seen anything like it."
Bernard looked up with a tired smile of his own. "Always amazing what you can do when you must."
Pirellus asked, "Did you spot anything?"
"No," Amara said, "but I believe our opposition was afraid that I would." She told them, in brief, about the conversation with Fidelias.
Bernard frowned. "You know. Maybe we should get as many people as we can into the wagons and get them on the road again. Can we hold long enough to let them get away?"
Pirellus looked at the wall and then at the other side of the courtyard. "It's a risk worth taking. I'll see to it," he said, shortly. "There won't be enough room for everyone, but we could get the children out, at least."
"Thank you," Amara told him.
Pirellus nodded to her. "You were right last night," he said. "I was
wrong." Then he headed out across the courtyard, steps steady despite his wounded leg.
Bernard whistled and said to Amara, "That cost him something, I think."
"Nothing he couldn't do without anyway," Amara said, her voice dry. "Bernard, those Knights are still out there, and they're going to be coming in on us again."
"I know," Bernard said. "But we don't have enough Knights Aeris to hold the sky. We don't know when or where they'll come."
Amara nodded to him. "But I think I have a good guess. Here's what I want you to do."
She laid out brief instructions for him, and he nodded, gathered up some more of the holders with him, and hurried off to carry out her plan. Amara checked in with Harger and then headed up onto the wall. The battlements were crowded with men, but she located Giraldi, standing soberly in position at the center of the wall, over the gate.
"Centurion," she greeted him.
"Countess."
"How does it look?"
He nodded out toward the oncoming Marat, hardly more than a mile away now. "They've stopped," he told her. "Out past our best bow range, even for these holder boys. They're waiting."